Parting the Cosmic Veil

by Lang, Kenneth R.

• ISBN13: 9780387307350
• ISBN10: 0387307354
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-08-30
• Publisher: Springer Verlag

Summary

Parting the Cosmic Veil describes our gradual awareness of a vast, previously concealed Universe, which is participating in ongoing processes of creation, destruction, and re-birth. Our growing knowledge of these phenomena has been made possible by spacecraft that have traveled throughout the Solar System and by new and sophisticated telescopes, operating at the visible wavelengths that we see with our eye. They have transformed the moons and planets from moving points of light to fascinating diverse worlds, detected giant planets revolving about nearby stars, revealed the true extent of the Milky Way and discovered billions of remote galaxies that are rushing away from us in an expanding Universe. Each of these galaxies contains billions of stars wheeling around their massive central hub.

Author Biography

Professor Lang has written several books about the Sun, as well as widely used reference works in astronomy and astrophysics. He has carried out radio observations of the active Sun with the Very Large Array in support of the SOHO spacecraft, teaches an extremely popular introductory course about the Sun to Tufts University students with non-scientific majors, and has served for two years as Visiting Senior Scientist in Solar Physics at NASA Headquarters.

Table of Contents

Preface	vii
List of Figures	xv
Cosmic Vision, War and Technology	1	(28)
No One Sees It All	1	(8)
The Sky Above and the Enemy Below	9	(6)
Stellar Energy, Atomic Bombs, and the Origin of the Elements	15	(6)
The Space Age	21	(4)
Supercomputers, Personal Computers and the Internet	25	(4)
Brave New Worlds	29	(28)
Unexplored Territory	29	(4)
Race to the Moon	33	(6)
The Close-Up View from Space	39	(6)
Planets Around Other Stars	45	(12)
Motion, Content and Form	57	(42)
Stop Moving and You're Dead	57	(3)
The Planets Move	60	(6)
The Distant, Moving Stars	66	(4)
Size and Shape of the Milky Way	70	(6)
Galaxies and the Expanding Universe	76	(11)
Age, Extent and Shape of the Observable Universe	87	(12)
The Explosive Universe	99	(52)
Pervasive Outbursts	99	(2)
Invisible Skies	101	(8)
Stars That Blow Themselves Apart	109	(7)
Rebirth from the Ashes -- Neutron Stars and Pulsars	116	(9)
Black Holes -- The Point of No Return	125	(4)
Cosmic Rage -- Radio Galaxies, Quasars and Gamma-Ray Bursts	129	(10)
The Big Bang	139	(12)
The Fullness of Space	151	(38)
Space Is Not Empty	151	(3)
We Live Inside the Expanding Sun	154	(3)
The Sun Curves Nearby Space	157	(6)
Gas and Dust Between the Stars	163	(6)
Dark Matter -- Evidence of Things Unseen	169	(6)
Making Everything From Nothing	175	(6)
Dark Energy	181	(5)
What We Have Learned So Far	186	(3)
Epilogue -- Origins and Destinies	189	(20)
Nothing Lasts, Everything Changes	189	(3)
Origin of the Universe	192	(6)
The Beginnings of Life	198	(5)
Fate, Dream and Wonder	203	(6)
Quotation References	209	(4)
Further Reading	213	(4)
Author Index	217	(4)
Subject Index	221